“Don’t worry, you’ll never have to talk to them again.”

That line’s been stuck in my head ever since an editor said it last summer – and it’s 100 percent wrong.

The editor and I were talking about a story I’d done, a case study involving some relatively new and complicated technology. I’d finished writing and, at her request, sent the draft to one of my sources – I know, bad editorial practice but totally not my call – to check that the convoluted tech stuff was factually accurate.

Only when I emailed the story to the source, I’d forgotten to remove some notes at the top that I’d written to the editor, notes that included some less than flattering comments about the source – nothing defamatory, nothing horrible, but embarrassing nonetheless.

That’s what prompted the editor’s comment to relax and forget about it because I’d never be talking to that person again.

It’s advice I promptly ignored.

Maybe that’s the way she does business. But it’s not how I operate.

To make a proper go of it as a freelancer, you’ve got to be a beat reporter, keeping up on the latest news and events in fields you cover. That means keeping in touch with a ever widening circle of contacts, because you never know when you’ll need to talk to someone or ask for a referral to someone they might know.

Over the years, I’ve prided myself in my source list. A friend and former co-worker still talks about the extensive list of contacts I left when she took over my newspaper beat while I went on maternity leave.

These days I use LinkedIn, Twitter and Google Desktop to keep tabs on sources and manage contact information online and within my computer files.

Sources are my pot of gold, my secret weapon. They’re the reason I can take 500-word assignments that only pays 50 cents a word, because I can tap into my source list to turn a story around in less than a day, making it financially feasible when calculating the work on an hourly basis.

I may treasure my sources, but I’m no pushover.  The only times I’d let a source see quotes before they’re published, go off the record or talk anonymously is if the editor asked or the circumstances warranted it. And asking tough questions is par for the course.

After I realized what I’d done and called the editor, I picked up the phone again and called my source. Even from across the the country, I’m sure they could tell my face was red. Luckily for me, they were pretty good about the whole thing and there were no lasting repercussions.

Moral of the story: Never, ever, include notes on a story that you wouldn’t want the world to see. And whatever you do, be good to your sources.

Twitter may get all the press right now, but if you write about business or need experts in any number of areas – medicine, careers, government – you can’t beat LinkedIn, the business online network with more than 40 million members, for finding story sources.

Here are some of my favorite ways to use LinkedIn to find sources:

1. Use LinkedIn as a contact manager. If you meet someone in person or online you think might make a good source, invite them to connect on LinkedIn. When you’re writing a story, look through your LinkedIn connections for potential sources and email them through the network to ask if they’re available for an interview. In LinkedIn’s Contacts section you can email one message to multiple recipients, so you can send the same interview request to several potential sources at once. Another feature of the Contacts section lets you sort connections by geography or industry, so you can send a group email to potential sources in a certain city or with a specific job title. If you use Microsoft Outlook, you can use LinkedIn’s Outlook Toolbar to manage your LinkedIn contacts in Outlook.

2. Ask a question in the Answers section. When I was a newspaper reporter, if I needed “man on the street” comments for a story I’d go to a local shopping center, sports arena or other place where I was bound to run into a lot of regular Joes. Today, I post a question on LinkedIn’s Answers section. If you use the Answers section to solicit quotes, word your question so it’s easy to understand and doesn’t elicit simple “Yes” or “No” answers. Always identify yourself as a reporter so people know whatever they say may be published. It’s a good idea to follow up with anyone who responds by email or telephone to verify they’re who they say they are, get additional information or comments and to make sure they understand you’re going to quote them.

3. Use the Advanced Answers Search. Another way to find sources is to use LinkedIn’s Advanced Answers Search feature, which uses keyword searches to dig deep into the backlog of Answers material to find what people have written about a particular subject. If a keyword search turns up one or more discussion threads on the topic you’re researching, scroll through the answers to determine whether any LinkedIn members in the discussions could be potential sources. If they are and you subscribe to one of LinkedIn’s premium service levels, send the prospective source an InMail requesting an interview. If you can’t send free InMails, check out the person’s LinkedIn profile for an email address, or track down their company Website and search for an email address for them there or contact the PR department and ask them to set up an interview.

4. Use the Companies profiles. This spring, LinkedIn overhauled its Companies section to include more information on businesses whose employees use the network. You can use the Companies section to search for employees at a specific company, or do keyword searches to search for companies by geography or industry. Once you find a prospective source, go through the same routine I outlined in step no. 3 to contact them.

5. Look up sources by their job title. – Need to interview IT managers or corporate HR directors? Use the People section of LinkedIn’s user database to search for sources by their specific job title. When you find prospects, go through the steps outlined above to contact them. Note that if the person works for a large company, they may request that you go through their company’s PR department to set up an interview.

I’ve blogged extensively on other ways writers can use LinkedIn.

What’s your favorite way to use LinkedIn to find sources?

You had the idea, wrote the query, got the assignment, negotiated the contract, worked out a deadline and did the research. Now all that’s left is interviewing the source.

What’s that, the source won’t answer your email or phone calls? Don’t they realize what you’ve had to do to get this far?

Unfortunately, just because you need to talk to a source doesn’t mean that they need to talk to you. They’re busy, they’re press shy, they’re grouchy, they’ve been warned by counsel or their media relations staff not to speak to the press.

That’s when you need to use your writer’s ingenuity to figure out how to get a reluctant source to talk anyway – or how to salvage a story if they won’t.

(If you’re a source of mine, feel free to stop reading at this point.)

If and when you run into an uncooperative source, do a quick gut check or touch base with your editor. Do you really need that specific source? Or would another person, company or expert with the same credentials, background or situation suffice?

If you need a particular source who’s yet to open up, here are my top 10 secrets to getting somebody to talk:

1. Send questions via email. If a source won’t make time to talk on the phone maybe they’ll respond to written answers. It’s not the best way to go but at least you’ll have something. These days, try Twitter too – somebody who won’t sit for an interview might be OK answer questions 140 characters at a time.

2. Find out if someone else is available. Worst case scenario: talk to an organization’s spokesperson.

3. Do an end run around gatekeepers. Sometimes the source you’re trying to reach doesn’t know about your request because their secretary, PR department, spouse or some other handler hasn’t told them. In those situations, search online, in phone books or elsewhere for a direct number or email address you can use to directly plead your case.

4. Call at odd hours. If you need to talk to an executive or business owner, call before or after hours when chances are good secretaries and receptionists aren’t there and the head honcho will pick up the phone themselves.

5. Investigate association or board affiliations. Websites for professional organizations often list names, bios and contact information for their board members.

6. Go where they’ll be. They may avoid your calls, but they can’t avoid you if you show up at their monthly Rotary Club lunch or annual industry trade show. You might only get a line or two or a “No comment” but it’s better than nothing.

7. Talk to friends or business partners. If your story has to do with something a person or company did, bought or sold, find one of their friends, colleagues or business partners and get the details from them. Then contact your source again and ask them to confirm the facts.

8. Check what’s already been written. Look online for previous articles, white papers, analyst write ups or case studies about the source, their organization or company. That way even if you end up not getting an interview, you’ll have some background – just make sure you include an attribution to the original source.

9. Search social networks. Look on LinkedIn, Twitter or Facebook to find out if your source hangs out there. If they do, ask them then and there to answer your questions. Or let your network know that you’re trolling for Ms. ABC or XYZ Company to talk to. Or put out a general call for help.

10. Be empathetic. Sometimes, especially if you’re dealing with someone who’s never been interviewed before, all they might need is a little coaxing and an explanation of how things work – what information you’re after, what on the record means, etc. – to feel comfortable enough to talk.

What techniques do you use to get reluctant sources to talk?

When people find out I work as a freelance writer they inevitable ask, where do you get your story ideas?

It’s a simple question, but not a simple answer. The fact is, I get ideas for stories everywhere, too many places to explain in a quick soundbite for a new acquaintance.

During any given week, I’ll find ideas for stories in the local newspaper, talking to a friend or in a trade magazine. I’ve added a few resources to my idea bag of tricks over the years, thanks mainly to the Internet. And I’m happy to share.

Here, in no particular order, and my 10 favorite sources of story ideas:

Covering breaking news - This is a daily reporter’s bread and butter. Not so much for magazine feature writers. But even feature writers are called upon occasionally to attend town meetings, trials, games, press conferences or other impromptu or staged public or private gatherings to do interviews, witness something first hand or gather color for a piece they’re working on. Breaking news can be a good source of follow-up stories too.

Interviews – You’re scheduled to do an interview for story A. Don’t pass up the chance to tack on a couple miscellaneous questions at the end that could serve as a start for story B. If you get good material, you can use it in a query letter on the subject, and if you get a bite, in the story too.

Conversations with acquaintances – I don’t write about family and friends. But I do listen carefully when they talk about what’s going on in their personal or work lives because you never know when you might hear something that clicks. This happened to me not long ago when a friend told me that her company had curtailed flying to meetings and was having people do more videoconferencing. I used that tidbit along with a couple other examples to successfully pitch a story on the growth of videoconferencing in the wake of climbing costs for fuel and air travel.

Message boards – Online message boards are the 21st century equivalent of the man-on-the-street interviews I used to do as a newspaper reporter, where I’d hang out in a public place and listen to what people were saying, or go up to people and pose a question I needed answered for the story I was working on. Now I scan message boards devoted to particular topics that tie into the story I’m working on.

The local newspaper – Yes, I blog, keep up with news through my RSS feeds and spend most of my working hours in front of a screen. But I’m still an avid dead-tree newspaper reader. I parse the local paper every morning. Stories on the business page can introduce me to companies or people that could fit into a national trend piece. I’ve gotten assignments for business stories from ideas I pitched about personalities from the sports pages. And you never know what gems are hidden in pages of the local news.

Academic journals – I don’t write about health, nutrition or science, but I know writers who do and they routinely read the academic journals in their area of interest for new studies and other research they can use as the basis of stories for general-interest publications.

Trade and industry magazines – “The trades” are equivalent of academic journals for business and technology writers like me, in that they are often the first places to cover new products, services or trends. An astute writer can take stories written for a trade audience and recast them into articles that appeal to a broader audience of lay readers.

Trade shows and conventions – Back in the day, I went to the Comdex computer trade show,  Consumer Electronics Show and Internet World every year. Each one was three or four days of intense information collection and I’d come back exhausted. But by sitting in on lectures and panel discussions, visiting exhibitors’ booths, collecting product literature and schmoozing at breakfast buffets and cocktail parties I had a stockpile of information to sift through back in my office for possible trend pieces, profiles and other stories.

Numbers – I love digging into a good 10K or 10Q. Spreadsheets make me swoon. It’s not that I love numbers, it’s that I love figuring out what they mean, and then building stories around them. And as Mary Chapin Carpenter sang, “…the stars might lie, but the numbers never do.”

Press releases and PR pitches – The stories I glean from press releases aren’t necessarily the ones the agencies are selling. But the company or product being pitched might fit into a completely different trend I’m writing about. Or if it includes a source who sounds like someone I might want to use in the future, I’ll keep tabs on them by I’ll inviting them to join my LinkedIn connections.

If you’ve been in the freelance business long, you’ve accumulated a pretty hefty source list. How do you keep track of all those names?

When I was a newspaper reporter, I used the simplest method possible. I created one text file for each subject I covered and made a running list. When I was feeling organized, I filed new sources alphabetically. When I was in a hurry I cut and pasted names at the top. It wasn’t pretty, but it got the job done.

Thankfully, keeping track of sources has gotten easier. Here are some suggestions that take advantage of software you already have or Internet-based services you might not know about.

1. Google Desktop – It’s a free software program you download from Google. Once you install it, you can use it the same way you use Google, using names or keywords to search email or Word documents. This only works if you keep interview notes on your computer.

2. Create a business contacts list in your email software program. This one’s the no-brainer. Microsoft Outlook was made for this. But if you’re like me, it’s easy to get busy and forget about. Some smart Internet software developers figured out that if people were too lazy to organize their email inboxes themselves, there was a market for a software program that did it for them. They invented Xobni, which is “inbox” spelled backwards. Read more about it in Dianna Huff’s MarComWriter blog in this post.

3. Join LinkedIn. Then invite your sources to become connections. I like this option even better than No. 2 because on LinkedIn there’s lots more information about someone in their LI profile than you would normally save in their Outlook contact file. Some people use other social networks like Facebook for the same purpose.

4. Create a spreadsheet or database. Disclaimer: I don’t do this. But theoretically, you could create a spreadsheet in Excel or a simple database in Access with information on contacts and then use the search or sort functions in those programs to find experts by name or keyword.

5. Use Del.icio.us. This social bookmarking site, which I’ve written about here and here, wasn’t set up to be a contact manager, but who’s to say you couldn’t use it for that purpose? Say you write about clothing boutiques in Seattle. Each time you hear about new one you want to keep track of, bookmark the company’s Website in Del.icio.us. Better yet, bookmark a couple pages, such as the pages for press releases, media contacts and company management.

I joined LinkedIn, the business social networking site, in September when I started working again. I’ve been a regular ever since. I posted some thoughts about how writers can use LinkedIn on Freelance Success, a freelance writers Web site, and people found them so helpful, I’m sharing them here.

Here’s how writers can use LinkedIn:

To reconnect with former colleagues from various places you’ve worked on staff or as a freelancer. If you’ve kept email addresses of old buddies in Outlook or another contact manager, you can import those into LinkedIn and see if they’re also members. If they aren’t, their email addresses are right at your finger tips to invite them. If you’ve created a detailed LinkedIn profile that lists places you’ve worked, you can go to the LinkedIn Home page to see how many other people at those companies are members and invite them to join your network. In my case, one of the ex-colleagues I asked to connect with is now an assigning editor at a couple news Web sites. She immediately offered me assignments and I’m writing a couple stories a month for her.

As a contact manager for all of the editors and editorial staff you work with. Most of the editors at publications I’m writing for are on it, as are their bosses, art directors, etc., so it’s kind of like a company directory.

As a contact manager for sources and potential sources. As I work on stories, I ask sources or the PR rep who set up the interview if they’re on LinkedIn. If they do, I ask them to join my network. If they don’t, I evangelize a little about the benefits and ask if I can introduce them to the service by inviting them to join my network. In most cases they accept. By doing this, I’m building up a virtual Rolodex of sources for future stories.

To find sources. Now that my contact list is in LinkedIn, I send group emails to subsets of the list when I’m looking for company examples in a certain industry or on a specific trend or issue. LinkedIn lets you slice and dice connections list by geography or industry, which makes it easy to put group emails together. You can also hand pick a group of names to send a message to.

To find potential sources. In LinkedIn’s Answers section, use the Keyword search function to find potential sources for stories by name, company name, etc. When I find someone that looks like they could be a subject matter expert and they have an email address listed on their LinkedIn profile, I send them a message directly. If I find someone I’m connected to indirectly, I’ll ask my 1st degree connection for an introduction. I always show my 1st degree connection the contents of the email I’m sending to their friends so they know the reason for my inquiry. I’ve found a few story sources this way, and in most instances, I’ve also added these people to my connections list. If I have no connection to that person, I might visit the company’s Web site and look up the PR contact in the “Media” or “About Us” section for a phone number.

To improve my work processes. I’m refining how I operate my freelance business, and information I’ve gleaned from fellow LinkedIn users has helped. In the long run I think this will effect my bottom line by increasing my productivity. For example, I’ve just finished reading a book on organization and time management, Take Back Your Life! Using Outlook to Get Organized and Stay Organized, by Sally McGhee (Microsoft Press), that I heard about on a LinkedIn Answer board. Another example: when I started working again, I wanted to go green by eliminating printing out interview and research notes before writing a story. I posted a question in the Question and Answer section asking how to do this and got a bunch of great suggestions, including one that I use all the time now – a Word feature that tiles two files horizontally on the screen at the same time, one for notes and one for writing.